Thursday, July 9, 2009

After having cornbread muffins on the Fourth, I wanted to make them at home. I found a recipe by the Neelys of the Food Network. I hate their show (way too much PDA and corniness -- Oh! Corniness!! Haha! Get it? Cuz it's about CORNbread? Hmm...), but I LOVE their honey cornbread muffins. It came out perfectly! I used the mini cupcake/muffin mold instead of the cupcake mold that it asked for. So it ended up making 32 mini muffins. It didn't take 15 minutes to bake. It took about 9 to 10 minutes instead. It's so crispy and yummy that I've eaten six so far today and haven't had lunch! Just two cups of coffee!Aren't they cute? I don't know why my muffins puffed up like that though. Don't they look like mushrooms? I expect little elves or fairies to come out of them.

Hubby and I waited all year for the Fourth of July. We started off our day by hiking the Stream Trail at the Redwood Regional Park in Oakland. Then we made sure to stop by the ATM to get cash for the yummy BBQed meats on sticks. Last year, my parents came to visit on the Fourth and we spent our time at Jack London Square before dinner at Yoshi's. As we walked around, we all drooled over the BBQ vendors. We were so good. We didn't eat any of it. We waited for our sushi dinner instead. So this year, we were totally looking forward to having the BBQed meats on sticks. But when we got there, there was no BBQed meat booths! We figured that they had the vendors and fireworks there every year, but I guess not! You don't know how grouchy I was. I was extremely disappointed and already had a headache from getting too much fresh air during our hike.

Anyways, we ended up going to Everett and Jones. We were so pleased when the host seated us in front of a window. But a few minutes later, he asks us to move to a smaller table. Normally, it wouldn't have really bothered me, but man, it ticked me off this time, but I politely moved. Anyways when our platter of BBQ came, I felt better. It had beef brisket, beef ribs, chicken, and beef links with the spicy and tangy sauce poured on everything. The best was the brisket. And the sides were so good. We loved the cole slaw and the cornbread muffins. The potato salad was delicious, too.

Friday, July 3, 2009

After we checked out (and ended up spending money at) the new Berkeley Bowl West, we headed over to Alameda to go eat. We ended up at Burma Superstar. There's always a wait, but not today since we got there before the dinner crowd.

Mango Tango and Lychee Julep. Both very good, but we let it rest a bit to allow the ice to melt to cut the sweetness.Platha with Coconut Chicken Curry. Mmm!Garlic Noodles with Duck. Great texture on this thin noodle, and loved the crunch of the fried garlic pieces.Burmese Style Curry with Shrimp. Reminded us of Singapore Chili Crab, but with curry. It was good, but on the too salty side. Hubby wanted Tiger beer as he ate this. Had this dish with jasmine and coconut jasmine rice.Jackfruit and Banana Fried Rolls with Nutella (and coconut ice cream and mango sorbet)